Tradition. It binds us. It binds us even if we need not be bound to it or hope not to be bound to it.
Having grown up in a traditional family. I was always expected to act in a traditional manner. Dad goes to the office. Mum stays in the kitchen. Well, mum, at least when she was around, realized that she can wear big boy pants. Dad had to keep up with her.
Having opened my eyes. I realized that I don’t always have to be “traditional.” I’ll keep tradition simply like wearing my underpants, er, under my pants. Tradition is the oldest form of “take it or leave it.” Tradition is that big booger up one’s nose that you can’t pick off in public.
Non-traditional becomes the unstoppable force. Tradition is the immovable object. What happens when the two collide? Non-traditional problems do not require traditional solutions, since they may not always work.
As I’ve grown to discover, they do sort of surrender to each other and have to do a bit of compromise from time to time. Non-traditional will always try to sneak in a few “insertions” here and there until tradition finally breaks down. Tradition will try to stay sane and will keep on trying until Non-traditional finally bogs down.
Good luck to both of them, seriously.
***
I think I should start a new category in this blog: Tales of a Split Personality
Wake Up and Smell the Coffee 
Addendum: COMPROMISE…boring…but it works.
The tail wags the dog. Non-traditional modes, methodologies and ideas are usually the ones that initiate change.
Though, I know where you’re coming from.
Lesson learned from life: non-traditional problems are hardly ever solved by traditional means. I agree, though…some amount of tradition is necessary…unless you prefer to wear your underwear everywhere else but under 😛
Compromise is sort of related to irony. The non-conformist would have to conform eventually.
Ahhh…not necessarily. I beg to disagree that it’s the non-conformist who eventually buckles and jumps in the traditional bandwagon.
I’m taking a class in Model Thinking right now, and one of the things I learned is that it’s usually the non-conformists, the non-traditionals who dictate movement in the society. Several factors of course play in, but generally speaking, and to simplify matters, think of a group with 5 members in it. Each individual has a threshold for conforming. Some may conform if there are 2 persons doing the same thing, while others need 4 people doing the same thing before they join in on the bandwagon. In our group of 5 people, one person has a threshold of 1 (needs just one person doing something before he conforms), 2 persons with a threshold of 2 (needs 2 people doing the same thing before they conform), 1 person with a threshold of 4 (needs 4 people doing the same thing before he conforms). The last person is the non-traditional, who initiates change. Let’s say the tradition is for everyone to be wearing black hat. But the non-traditional non-conformist thinks, well I look so much better in an orange hat. So he buys an orange hat and wears it. At this point, most everyone in the society thinks he’s nuts and ignores him, keeping to the traditional black hat. But the one person with a threshold of 1, thinks, hey someone’s doing it, I think I’ll do it, too. So he does. Now there’s 2 of them wearing the silly orange hat. Then the 2 people with a threshold of 2 join in, and now there’s 4 of them wearing the orange hat. The fourth person in the group, the most vehemently traditional who’d prefer to stick to the black hat, now reaches his threshold level, and eventually conforms. Now, everyone in the group is wearing the silly orange, non-traditional hat.
Imagine a scenario where everyone has a very low threshold to conform. Let’s say they all have a threshold of 1, needing just one person doing one different thing before they conform. What happens? Nothing. If no one initiates anything, even in a society where everyone is likely to conform, no change occurs.
The tail wags the dog. It’s the non-traditionals who dictate change 😛
Take the RH Bill. If no one brought it up, if everyone just wanted to stick with the old traditional ways, there wouldn’t be this resonating clamor for change.
The tail wags the dog.
(I think I just wrote a blog entry in your blog 😛 Hahahahaah! 😛 Congratulations, you just encouraged me to write again :P)
Hahaha. It’s okay, doc.
I remember being the only one wearing shorts in my classes back in Uni. I got teased often that I come from a flooded area. 2 semesters later, the same people teasing me were in the same attire already. It’s a classic case of people who bad mouth things they do not understand or get…a simple matter of clothes. They didn’t get it that I wasn’t dressing up to impress them.
As a note, I only wore my jeans in chemistry lab…and on important gatherings. That’s compromise. LOL
Brian, I don;t get it. O.Oa
Hey, kiddo.
I noticed that I’ve been writing mostly odd stuff lately. Sorry for that.
This one is about a clash of ideals — all in my head. It’s about keeping oneself at bay even if going the opposite way is needed and vise versa.